Tuesday, September 18, 2007

AGENT ORANGE - A PRIVATE EMAIL TO GREG THOMPSON!!!

Peter Stoffer of the NDP has taken an aggressive stance against you and has called for your resignation at any opportunity he has had, with media here in the Halifax area, and, I presume, across Canada, as his party's Defence critic.

I was a member of the Royal Canadian Army in 1966, 67 and stationed at Gagetown during the time Agent Orange and other carcinogens were showered so liberally on unsuspecting Canadians.

I am not a supporter of ANY political party and, therefore, I will not stand for any politician using my life's circumstances to advance their political profile ... in fact, I find it reprehensible. Any politician who would stoop to this is the lowest of the low, in my opinion.

That said, it is precisely this cheap political gamesmanship that has made me recognize that political parties exist only for themselves. My faith and trust in what should be my government has long been nullified by such feigned expressions of umbrage, ostensibly on my behalf, in order to score points with the public.Is this how Canadians are defined ... as a people prepared to sacrifice other Canadians by placing them in harm's way?

If it is, I am disgusted and ashamed to call myself "Canadian". Personally, I am apathetic about the amount of money you and the Department of Veteran's Affairs have offered to those afflicted as the final result of some politician's cavalier and careless regard for the lives of their fellow Canadians.

For your government to quantify the value of a life, with such an amount, is a slap in the face to everyone affected, to be sure ... but, for any politician, such as MP Peter Stoffer to attempt to make political points with the public, is just as big an affront.

It is disturbing and disgusting to think that MY government would allow and encourage the dispersement of those "rainbow" chemicals used so liberally in 1966 , 1967, and beyond ... while these same chemicals were outlawed for testing in the United States on that country's military.

I will never, ever forget or forgive this country for allowing some bureaucrat to believe that I, and all others who were exposed to these poisonous and life altering carcinogens, am no better than a lab rat.

My silence is not for sale .... nor will I be satisfied, until there is a full, expository inquiry into why this was ever allowed ...and further compounded by being part of a cover-up for the past forty one years. .

All political parties in Ottawa and the bureaucracy,are complicit in this cover-up.